


weeping willow romance

by meshtams



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: (in the form of mentions of self-harm scars), Bisexual Harry Potter, Desi Harry Potter, Gay Draco Malfoy, Hogwarts Eighth Year, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, M/M, POC Harry Potter, Pierced Harry Potter, Pining Draco Malfoy, Romance, Scars, Smart Draco Malfoy, Tattooed Draco Malfoy, Tree Climbing, Weeping Willow - Freeform, both already have established feelings okok, draco malfoy wears muggle clothes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-09
Updated: 2020-12-09
Packaged: 2021-03-10 10:41:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,816
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27969236
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/meshtams/pseuds/meshtams
Summary: draco spends his weekends up his favourite tree. one day, harry joins him
Relationships: Draco Malfoy/Harry Potter
Comments: 3
Kudos: 110





	weeping willow romance

The world was so much easier to deal with when it was upside down. Or at least, that’s what Draco Malfoy thought.

When the world was the right way up, he was a death eater who deserved the hexes and curses thrown at him almost constantly. When the world was the right way up, his father was in Azkaban awaiting the Dementor’s kiss, and his mother had locked herself in the manor. When the world was the right way up, he would never be loved back by the only person he’d ever even been interested in.

But when the world was upside down, he was just Draco. Just Draco, with floppy blond hair, and a few too many scars for an eighteen-year-old, and two full sleeves of muggle tattoos, along with one along his left side, that even his mother didn’t know about. When the world was upside down, it didn’t matter that he’d taken the dark mark, under threat of his parents’ death, when he was barely sixteen years old. When the world was upside down, maybe Just Draco could one day be good enough for Harry Potter.

That’s why Draco Malfoy was hanging by his legs from a tree.

It was barely eight am, but the sun was up enough that he no longer needed the _lumos_ he’d cast to get down to his favourite tree on the edge of the forest from his dorm. It was a weeping willow, which hid him away as he hung from the lowest branch- it was probably still too high to be safe for him to be on, but it’s not as if anyone would even notice if he fell and hit his head.

No-one in the eighth-year dorms were typically up before nine on a Saturday, except for Potter, who hadn’t noticed when Draco slipped out of their common room under a notice-me-not. He was very much glad of this, because he really didn’t need anyone asking about his muggle clothes. In the two weeks between his trial and the first day of his eighth-year, he’d stayed in a grotty hotel in the middle of muggle London, and had replaced most of his casual clothes with muggle attire.

Right then, Draco was wearing his softest black skinny-jeans, a long-sleeved grey t-shirt and shoes the muggles had called “Converse”. He had to admit, they were drastically easier to climb trees in than his robes and Italian loafers had always been.

So, Draco hung, like he did every weekend, his ankles crossed to give him a bit of extra stability as he swung back and forth slightly, his knees hooked comfortably over the tree branch and his arms loosely swinging. This weekend, however, differed from the norm as someone pulled open the curtain of leaves on his tree. Draco startled and unhooked one leg, only to cross it back over the other side of the branch and swing himself over until he was sitting perched on top of the branch, his hair falling into his grey eyes.

“Why are you in a tree?” Potter. Of course it was fucking Potter. To make matters worse, his voice wasn’t cruel, or even slightly mocking. No, he just sounded vaguely curious, which paired with his ridiculously green puppy-dog eyes and the soft-looking t-shirt and plaid overshirt he had on made Draco ache with longing.

“Being in a tree.” He was glad his voice had finally lost its instinctive snap, so he didn’t sound as rude as he had in years past, but he knew his answer was a complete non-answer; he didn’t know how to put into words the safety and comfort he felt in trees, particularly this tree.

He was therefore surprised when Potter just nodded thoughtfully. “Can I join you?”

“I- if you like.” Draco’s voice came out as barely a whisper, but Potter grinned and oh god, Draco was so completely gone over this man.

“Cool. One minute.” He looked at the tree for a second before running directly at it, getting his foot up and using the momentum to swing himself up to grasp at one of the gnarls in the trunk. Within thirty seconds, Harry was standing on Draco’s branch, leaning against the trunk and grinning as Draco swung himself back down to hang again. Draco was secretly impressed- Harry was almost as good at climbing trees as he himself was.

“How’d you find me, anyway?”

“I’ve got a map. It shows where everyone is in the castle; most of the forest’s cut off, but the first layer or so is on the edge. Saw you out here and got curious.” Draco was surprised, but he wasn’t quite sure why- of course Harry had a magic map. Why the fuck not.

He was further surprised when Harry walked across the branch and settled himself to hang right beside him.

A few moments passed in silence until it was broken by Harry. “Bloody hell, how are you not getting head-rush?” Draco turned his head and saw the other boy’s usually soft-brown skin was flushed and red as the blood pooled there, and he couldn’t hold in a snigger.

He flicked his wrist to release his wand from its forearm holster and pointed it at Harry’s face. “ _ne nimio impetu sanguinis caput permina._ ”

Harry’s face stopped resembling a tomato almost immediately, and he smiled gratefully. “What was that?”

“’S just a charm that stops excess blood rushing to your head.” Draco muttered and looked away, letting his head fall back.

“Well, it works! Can you teach me it?” Harry’s grin was playful, and Draco felt as if he’d somehow stepped into an alternate universe, or been hit on the head, or confunded, or maybe just that he was having a really, really unfair dream.

“No need, its permanent.”

“Christ. Where did you learn that?”

Draco knew that if he could, he’d be blushing as he looked out towards the curtain of leaves around him. “I didn’t.”

Harry was confused. “What do you mean? How’d you know it if you never learned it?”

Draco rolled his eyes. Harry could be so smart, but he could sometimes be a complete idiot- almost any Slytherin or Ravenclaw, or even Granger, would have realized what he meant. “I mean I never learned it. I created it.”

“You CREATED it?! You can create spells?” Harry sounded shocked.

Draco huffed and lifted his head again and made eye-contact with the green-eyed boy. “Yes? Its really not that difficult. If you’re in touch with your magic, its fairly easy to do. Most of our spells tend to be in Latin, so its easiest to start with learning Latin, and then using your magic to sort of define what you want your spell to do, and just play around with the wording and wand movements until it works. Simple.” He shrugged.

Harry looked almost awed. “That’s really bloody impressive. You learned Latin? Hang on, my legs aren’t going to hang on for much longer.” Harry cut himself off and swung upwards, grabbing the branch with both hands and using the extra leverage to flip himself over until he was sat upright on the top of the branch. Draco rolled his eyes and turned himself around before flipping back up onto the branch the same way he had done when Harry had arrived, running one long-fingered, pale hand through his platinum hair to push it back, keeping it out of his eyes. “Christ, I don’t know how you do that with just your legs.” Harry huffed a laugh as Draco smirked almost smugly, and then froze as he caught sight of the tattoos peaking out from the long sleeves of Draco’s t-shirt where it had been displaced in his movement. “Do you have tattoos?” His eyes were filled with incredulous curiosity.

The blond’s blood ran cold. Of course, as always, the one secret not even his best friend Pansy was aware of had been found out by Harry bloody Potter.

Seeing the panic forming in Draco’s eyes, Harry spoke again. “I won’t tell anyone if you don’t want me to.” Draco looked doubtful, and Harry had an idea- not bothering to grab his wand, he cast a quick _finite_ on the low-level glamour on his right eyebrow, just where his scar cut through, revealing the little metal bar he’d gotten put in by a muggle piercer over the summer that not even Ron and Hermione knew about. “Mutually assured destruction or whatever.” He grinned.

Draco looked at him for a moment in silence, his heart beating rapidly at both his secret being found out and the sight of Harry hot-as-fuck Potter with an EYEBROW PIERCING. The lopsided grin and the crinkle of his scar where it broke off into tiny bolts under his eye felt like they were going to kill Draco, and throwing caution to the wind, he grinned back. “Mutually assured destruction.” He pulled off his t-shirt and holster, still grinning.

Harry’s eyes widened to see the sheer amount of tattoos Draco had. His entire left arm was covered in greyscale flowers and plants, starting with a ring of lilies and narcissus wrapping around his wrist and up over the thick knot of scarring where his dark mark used to be, up through dittany, goldenrod and lavender over what looked like years of self-harm scarring around his upper arm, and finishing with aconite blooms over his shoulder and reaching towards his collarbone. His right arm was slightly more varied- the upper half covered in a huge hawthorn tree with a small unicorn silhouette against the trunk on the inner part, a ring of runes Harry vaguely recognized as protective and healing from Hermione’s ancient runes textbook, and the bottom half covered by a huge, detailed snake wrapping around his entire forearm and surrounded by swirling smoke-like shapes. His left side was largely covered by a very accurate black-and-white depiction of an antipodean opaleye dragon.

He gasped. “Merlin! They’re beautiful.”

Draco looked down, letting his hair fall back across his face. “Thanks. My artist, Leah, she’s pretty incredible.” He smiled slightly, thinking of the short, green-haired old muggle woman. Honestly, he was half tempted to book another tattoo just to see her again. He appreciated her biting wit and no-nonsense attitude- she reminded him of a combination of his mother and Madame Pomphrey, only with short, spiky green hair and at least twenty piercings he could see.

“They’re muggle, right?”

“Yeah. Got them all done over about three days this summer while I was staying in muggle London.”

“Didn’t that hurt?”

“Hm. I’ve had worse.” Draco’s voice was bitter as he though of the seemingly infinite pain of the cruciatus curse. He’d been held under that more times over the past year and a half than he could count.

“Yeah? Fair enough, I guess.” Harry nodded, as if he understood exactly what he was saying- then again, he probably did. Draco knew that Harry had been mentally connected to the dark lord, plus he could be much more observant than most people gave him credit for. “Holy shit!” Draco looked up to see Harry staring at his chest in horror. Or, more specifically, staring at the thick, criss-crossing scars up and down his entire torso. Draco saw his eyes track along the longest one, from the exposed jut of his hip-bone and up, taking in the way it thickened over his stomach and chest and then thinned into a barely-there white line up his neck and across his chin. Draco quickly pulled his shirt back on even though he knew it was pointless by now. “Did I do that? In the bathroom?”

“Yes.” Draco’s voice was barely a whisper and he looked down towards the mossy ground.

He was surprised to feel Harry move closer, his knees knocking into Draco’s, and even more surprised when a square, callused hand cupped his jaw, the thumb running over the scar and the fingers pulling his face up to look directly into Harry’s. “I’m so sorry. I had no idea what that spell did, and I wish I hadn’t used it. It’s the worst thing I’ve ever done.”

“It’s okay. I never really blamed you. I mean, the scars are ugly, but no one ever sees them anyway, so it doesn’t matter.” He smiled a little self-deprecatingly.

“What, no one? What about Parkinson?” Harry realized his hand was still resting on Draco’s face, but the taller boy didn’t seem to mind, so he chose to just enjoy the soft contact while he could.

“What, Pansy? Why on earth would she see them?” Draco laughed.

“I thought… Aren’t you two together?” Harry’s face was screwed up a little in confusion.

“God, no! We just told people that in fourth year so they wouldn’t figure out that we were both gay!” Draco was still laughing.

“You’re- oh.” Harry’s heart pounded in his chest. “So, do you not have a boyfriend then?”

Draco was vaguely puzzled as to why Harry seemed so interested in this. “No, no boyfriend. I’ve had feelings for the same guy since first year but I think he’s straight. And even if he wasn’t, I doubt he’d be interested.”

“Then he’s an idiot.” Harry’s heart ached with the knowledge that Draco had feelings for somebody else. It wasn’t really surprising, or at least it shouldn’t be, but it still hurt.

Draco laughed shortly. “Not really, he’s a lot smarter than people tend to give him credit for. So, what about you, are you still with the littlest Weasley?” Draco was incredibly aware of the hand still stroking his face, and it took all of his self-control not to nuzzle into the warm palm like a fussy kneazle.

“What, Gin? No, we broke up at the end of sixth year. She’s been with Luna for a few months now, and over the summer I figured out that I’ve actually been in love with this guy for years, probably since, like, first year, if I’m being honest.”

Draco froze. “A- a guy? I thought you were straight.”

Harry laughed nervously, something about that statement niggling in the back of his mind. “Nope, I’m bisexual.”

“Oh.” Draco couldn’t help but stare at Harry’s lips. Somehow knowing that he was into men was even more painful, because he knew that Harry would still never want him, after all, he had feelings for someone else, probably Weasley or Thomas or one of his other Gryffindor friends.

Harry caught Draco staring at him lips and his breath caught. He almost couldn’t let himself think about it, but what if the guy Draco had feelings for was him? Surely that couldn’t be possible, but Draco had let him see his tattoos, let him touch his face and practically melted against his hand. He summoned every bit of Gryffindor courage he had and leaned in, pressing his lips against Draco’s.

Draco gasped, opening his mouth and melting into the kiss as Harry wrapped his strong, warm arms around him. Just before the kiss would have naturally deepened, Harry pulled back.

“Draco-” Draco expected a rejection, to be told that the kiss was a mistake, and he almost couldn’t bare even the thought of it. “Just so you know, the guy I was talking about, that I’m in love with, was you.” Harry’s voice was vulnerable and fragile- he too expected a rejection, for Draco to tell him that he didn’t feel the same, that he was talking about Nott or Zabini or anyone else.

Tears slipped down Draco’s cheek silently as he smiled in disbelief, whispering “Me too.” Before crashing his lips back onto Harry’s. Harry wrapped Draco up in his arms and pulled him until he was practically sitting in his lap, deepening the kiss and slipping the hand not on his face around to settle on his lower back, while Draco’s thin fingers wrapped themselves in Harry’s thick, curly hair. They kissed for what felt like both hours and minutes, but when they finally broke apart the sun was beginning to set.

“We should probably go in for dinner.” Draco’s voice was low and soft.

“Probably. Would you be okay with letting people know about us, or would you rather we didn’t just yet?” Draco was so overcome by the fact that Harry would be willing to keep their relationship a secret to make him feel more comfortable, even though that was so not Harry’s style, that he pressed another loving kiss to his boyfriend’s lips.

“Tell whoever you like.” Draco felt almost giddy at the idea.

“So, everyone then.” He grinned crookedly. “Will you come and sit with me for dinner?”

Draco pretended to think it over until Harry started to almost pout. “Of course I will, love.” He laughed lightly.

“Bastard.”

“Yep. You love it.” Draco smirked cheekily.

Harry pressed a soft kiss to the side of Draco’s neck. “I really do.”

**Author's Note:**

> ok, so:
> 
> the spell draco created and used literally (according to google translate) translates to "prevent excess blood rush to head" with the word "permina" (a made-up derivation of permanent) tacked onto the end
> 
> dracos tattoos are:  
> lilies (a tribute to his feelings for harry)  
> narcissus (for his mother)  
> dittany, goldenrod and lavender (for healing)  
> aconite (helpful in potions, represent death, link to trick question in philosophers stone- for severus)  
> hawthorn and unicorn (for his wand)  
> runes (if anyone needs protection and healing after the war its that boy jfc)  
> snake (slytherin pride bitchezzzzz)  
> dragon (for his name obvi)


End file.
